The Girl Who Left Paradise (6min)

The grass was greener than anywhere else she had ever seen
it. There was a large garden, an old wooden shack, goats and cows, and a well-furnished
house at the end of the pasture. The property was surrounded by white
mountains, green hills, and flower fields that made one feel to be in paradise.

The girl was the daughter
of a wealthy farmer. Her face was beautiful, and she enjoyed admirers from all
corners of the country. Servants took care of her, said sweet things to her,
and labored for her so that she could live in comfort.

Her future was bright, safe, and her parents were full of
hope that she would marry the worthiest of all admirers. That she would inherit
the farm and have children. It was their wish that she never would be in need
to worry as their wealth would always back her, even if she would not do a
single day’s labor for as long as she lived.

She had it all. All which the common people were so
desperately hoping for, working for, even suffering for. And she hadn’t had to
do anything for it. Wealth had been given to her, as well as admiration and
beauty.

And yet, the wealth, the beauty, the admirers, and her
bright future did not make the young woman happy. She smiled often, but just
because it was custom to do so. What hid behind her kind smile and her beautiful
face, was something no one seemed to look at. And so, only she knew the
dreadful feeling of emptiness – the feeling of purposelessness, the feeling of meaninglessness
that walked with her wherever she went on the big property.

One evening, the young woman saw a falcon gliding in the air
and circling the pasture from above. “The falcon
is free,” she thought. “He has no wealth, no property, no possessions. And yet,
he is free to go wherever he wants. Fearless is he
because he has nothing to lose.” She imagined how the next day, the falcon could
already circle over new lands. The sight of the falcon gave the woman courage and
hope. For she had everything and still
felt empty.

Not many days passed, and one night, when family and servants
were asleep, the young woman thought about the Falcon and left her home. She
left behind the bright future, the admirers, the security, her wealth – the paradise
that she was born into.

She traveled far away to distant lands where she was equal
to all others and where she hoped to find what she had failed to find at home.

After a long period of traveling and wandering, sleeping
under the stars, begging from farmers and merchants, she arrived in a small
town.

Without wealth and without a helping hand, she built a
little house at the border of a forest close to the town. It was an idyllic
place. The grass was green too, and a small river passed not far from the
wooden walls of her new small house.

She was far away from home. In a land where nobody seemed to
appreciate her beauty, and she realized how ideals
of beauty change, like the trees and plants
change, the further you travel. She had no admirers and no servants, and yet, for
the first time in her life, she felt happy.

For the first time in her life, she had a task, something to
do, something meaningful to create, to build. Nothing was given to her – but
she had to work for it. And so she worked. And as she worked, she made contact
with the people of the town.

With time she learned the foreign language, she helped and received help. She made friends and
fell in love with a poor merchant.

The merchant had no money and had no wealthy family. Neither
was he in possession of good property. And
yet, the merchant gave her something that no one of her admirers in the past
had given to her. And the young woman learned that love was not about pretty
faces and lots of gold, but about something that she could not describe in
words.

Life wasn’t easy. No, life was challenging. Many cold winter
nights they cuddled close to the chimney in the small wood-house that she had
once built at her arrival. And many hot summer days they worked hard to provide
themselves with food. At times she shed tears of despair, and at other times
she felt betrayed by the dry summer days and by the frosty winter nights that
wouldn’t allow her to harvest food in abundance and prosper quickly and live in
the comfort that she was used to as a child.

She often wished to have great
livestock and long fields that prospered
with vegetables. Servants that occasionally did the work for her. She sometimes
cried. And sometimes she was angry. And yet, she was happy. She was happy
because she had a goal. And she learned that happiness not only consisted of
smiles and euphoria, but that happiness was beyond her everchanging emotions.
Like the sun that must see a different planet crossing his eyesight every hour,
and yet never changes its position.

The hot summers always left, and the cold winters did so
too, and each year she learned. And each year she became wiser, and each year
she and the poor merchant were able to establish a little more comfort for
themselves. Hard work pays off if one is
patient and open to learn and to adapt.

The years passed, and the youth of the woman slowly faded.
And still, she was happy. Like the sun. Fortune and wealth came to them, for
they had never given up, and the little house had long turned into an old
shack. She gave birth to a girl, and the
merchant had built a well-furnished house for her.

Their livestock had grown to a size that not only fed her
family, but also many others of the town. Servants served her, and their property
had expanded over the years. The fields with fruits and vegetables had become long
and wide, and the ground brought out fresh food every few months.

She was an accomplished old
woman. She lived in paradise, in her own paradise, at the border of the forest,
close to the town. And when she remembered that, once, she had come here with
nothing, she felt gratitude and pride about her achievements.

"But if only my daughter could see and appreciate the comfort,
I had worked so hard for," she thought.

Because her daughter didn’t see how lucky she was. She was
admired, beautiful, and she had never known what it was like to be poor. Never
had she known what it was like to create something from nothing. And never was
she able to see what her mother, so desperately, wanted her to see.

It saddened the mother and frustrated the daughter so that,
one day, the daughter left and wandered forth into new lands.

Much grief fell over the old woman. For weeks she shed tears
and dwelled in disbelief on how her daughter could have left the paradise that
she and the merchant had created for her.

She grieved until one evening she saw a falcon circling over
the pasture. The old woman then remembered her own upbringing. She thought
about the green grass fields of her birthplace,
the servants, the goodwill of her
parents, the hills and the mountains, and, for the first time in her life, she
saw how she had been blind to the beauty and perfection that had always surrounded
her as a young woman.

A smile came upon her face. For many years, she had been
trying to squeeze her daughter into her own paradise, into her own ideas of perfection.

She smiled more, and a tear of joy escaped from one of her watery
eyes when she knew that her daughter will find her own way. Like she had found
it. And like the falcon found it every single day.

It takes little courage to build one’s paradise, but faith
and goodwill.

It takes a lot of courage, she thought then, to leave
someone else’s paradise, to create one’s
own.

She too had once learned
to be happy when she gave away everything and had nothing to lose. And she prayed
for her daughter because she knew that it
was not poverty that made her happy, but the task of creating something new.